ATK to use Mehmet Haberal method for Şahinkaya and Evren

The Council of Forensic Medicine (ATK) will examine former generals Kenan Evren and Tahsin Şahinkaya in hospital if they refuse to attend the ATK for an examination.

Evren and Şahinkaya are standing trial in the Sept. 12, 1980 coup case under charges of perpetrating a military coup, but have not attended the hearing due to health complaints. The institution did the same for Professor Mehmet Haberal, who is imprisoned for his role in Ergenekon, a shadowy crime network which has alleged links with the state and is suspected of plotting to topple the government.

The 1980 coup trial began in Ankara last week, but Evren, 94, and Şahinkaya, 86, did not attend the first hearing, citing health complaints. Prosecutors seek life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for Evren and Şahinkaya. The Ankara 12th High Criminal Court, which is hearing the 1980 coup trial, has sent the results of medical examinations of the former generals to the ATK to determine whether the generals’ health conditions affect their ability to attend the hearings of the trial. The ATK will first invite Evren, who is in Ankara, and Şahinkaya, who is now at the Haydarpaşa Gülhane Military Academy of Medicine (GATA), for a medical examination at the institution’s facilities in İstanbul. If the former generals refuse to attend, ATK doctors will visit Evren and Şahinkaya to determine whether they are medically eligible to attend the trial. ATK doctors will send their final reports to the court.

Last January, doctors from the ATK examined Haberal at the hospital where he had been receiving treatment to ascertain whether he was indeed in poor health. The doctors, who all specialize in cardiology, examined the professor in his hospital room after doctors refused to send him to the ATK for an examination due to his poor health.